Hardening Azure Virtual Networks: NSGs, ASGs & Azure Bastion Architecture
Eliminating public IP addresses from backend virtual machines and securing administrative access using managed browser tunnels.
The Danger of Public IPs on Cloud Virtual Machines
Assigning public IP addresses to backend Azure virtual machines (database servers, internal web applications) exposes them to automated internet-wide port scans, brute-force bots, and zero-day vulnerabilities.
Application Security Groups (ASGs) for Micro-Segmentation
Rather than managing complex Network Security Group (NSG) rules based on ephemeral IP addresses, organize VMs into logical Application Security Groups (e.g., `ASG-Web`, `ASG-App`, `ASG-DB`) and define clean multi-tier firewall rules.
Deploying Azure Bastion for Secure RDP & SSH
Azure Bastion provides fully managed, platform-level RDP and SSH connectivity directly over TLS through the Azure Portal, eliminating the need for public jump boxes or exposing ports 3389/22 to the public internet.
Related Articles & Advisories
AWS IAM Architecture: Enforcing Least Privilege with Permission Boundaries
A technical blueprint for preventing privilege escalation, eliminating wildcards (*), and enforcing guardrails across multi-account AWS Organizations.
Kubernetes Security: Pod Security Standards, Network Policies & Strict RBAC
Preventing container escape, restricting service account tokens, and implementing micro-segmentation across EKS, AKS, and bare-metal clusters.
Container Image Scanning and Software Supply Chain Security (SBOM)
Integrating vulnerability scanning into CI/CD pipelines, signing images with Cosign, and enforcing software bill of materials (SBOM) policies.